Only 27 per cent of staff happy with pay and benefits at Charity Commission

Charity Commission staff are predominantly unhappy with their pay and benefits, according to a new civil service engagement survey.

Commission staff were asked a series of questions tracking their “engagement index” as part of the annual Civil Service People Survey 2018 – which measures how civil servants views their current roles within government agencies.

Over 90 per cent of Commission staff completed the survey, which found that only 27 per cent of respondents felt that their pay “adequately reflects” their performance, compared to a 31 per cent median benchmark across the civil service.

On the topic of the total pay and benefits package offered by the Commission, 33 per cent said they were satisfied, compared to 36 per cent of all civil servants. Only 22 per cent of Commission employees said they felt their pay was “reasonable” when compared to others doing a similar role in other organisations, compared to 27 per cent across the civil service.

While these figures were low, they were an improvement on the scores given to the Commission’s pay and benefits programme by staff last year; where only 17 per cent of respondents said their pay adequately reflected performance and only 15 per cent felt they were paid in line with staff at similar organisations.

Big increase in staff belief in board's vision

On the topic of leadership and managing change, 38 per cent of Commission respondents said they were confident that “when changes are made in [my organisation] they are usually made for the better”, while 41 per cent said they felt that change was “managed well” at the regulator.

Commission respondents showed a marked improvement in terms of their own views of the regulator’s board, with 63 per cent saying they believed that “the board has a clear vision for the future” of the organisation, up from just 28 per cent in 2017.

Staff at the Charity Commission reported a 65 per cent positive response in terms of the overall "employee engagement index", which put the regulator in the top third of the civil service overall.

In response to whether or not Commission staff felt interested in their work, more than 90 per cent of staff responded positively.

Regulator staff were also very positive about the teams they are working in, with 90 per cent of respondents reacting positively when asked whether or not people in their team “can be relied upon to help when things gets difficult”.

Some 88 per cent of Charity Commission respondents said they had a clear understanding of the organisation’s objectives, while 87 per cent said they understood how their work contributes to the Commission’s objectives.

'Delighted to see such positive results'

Helen Stephenson, chief executive of the Charity Commission, said: “I am delighted to see such positive results about our staff engagement – this year they are at the highest level in ten years and take us into the top third across the civil service. Our staff play such an integral part in our ability to regulate effectively in order to ensure that charities can thrive and inspire trust. It is therefore absolutely vital that we value their contribution and treat them with respect.

"The results show that our staff feel proud to work at the Commission, are driven by our purpose, and feel inspired and motivated in what they do – in turn, they motivate me and my senior team. I am truly grateful to have a team that is such a credit to the Commission, and the civil service more broadly. However we are not complacent, and there is still more to improve upon. We will continue to listen and learn, and put our workforce right at the heart of what we do.”

The survey was conducted across 102 branches of the Civil Service, with over 300,000 staff participating in the survey.